Leading the Horse to Water
by DeejayMil
Summary: The thing about growing up is, you forget what it's like to be a kid. In the end, we're all defined by the small moments of living, even if we don't remember them.


**Leading the Horse to Water**

 _Written for the /r/fanfiction challenge 'random word prompt'_

 _The three random words were 'horseradish', 'country', and 'threat'._

 _Thanks to Tafferling for running this months challenge :D_

 **.**

 **.**

"Take her somewhere educational," Elizabeth Prentiss had demanded, and Emily had pertly replied with, "Screw educational, it's the holidays!"

So now she's grounded, which in the dysfunctional world of the Prentiss's, means she has to spend the entire week long stay in the arse-end of England with her mom's new assistant, and he's a _bore_.

"I'll run away if you speak to me," she'd threatened him, and his watery blue eyes had widened pathetically as he imagined her mother's reaction to _that_. Emily had considered a few other choice words, since Olivia had pointed out last week at school that always playing nice wasn't exactly the way to get what you want, and Emily had taken that advice to heart.

Then she'd changed her mind because the man had looked upset and it's not his fault her mom is… demanding.

So she's left sitting in her room at the hotel with the too-crisp sheets and the Stepford staff with their empty smiles waiting for anything to happen. She's pretty sure she shot herself in the foot by threatening to run away, because even educational is better than staring out over the dreary countryside through rain-speckled glass.

"You are," says a soft voice behind her, "A terrible bore of an eight-year old, Emily Prentiss."

Emily turns and blinks. Peyton is standing there, his face remarkably calm, holding an arm-full of yellow _something_ , and he's insulting her!

"Excuse me?" she says frostily, standing and scowling.

"You tell me you don't want to go out because it's 'boring' and then you sit in your room and do nothing. How, exactly, is this getting back at your mother? Seems to me like you're doing exactly what she wants you to do."

The man is outrageous! He's… _rude_. Obnoxious, even.

He's right.

"What do you know about living with my mother?" she says in her best 'daughter of a diplomat' voice, and he smiles. It's infuriating – he's not supposed to be _smiling_. He's supposed to be angry and complaining about her until her mom agrees to go home early and she can see her friends again. At least, her friends until the next time they move anyway. "She doesn't want me to do anything but look pretty and not embarrass her…"

Her voice has turned whiney, damn. She hadn't wanted that.

He keeps smiling and it makes his face nicer. Emily pretends she doesn't notice. Mom's assistants never have time for her beyond trying to suck up to her to curry favour, and she likes it that way. She does. She doesn't need to make friends with them.

She doesn't need friends here.

"Well," he continues, and holds out the yellow. She takes it and unfolds it to reveal a horrid yellow raincoat, slick and bright and _awesome_. It's the ugliest thing she's ever seen. She loves it immediately. "I happen to think that getting dirty is very educational. Not very pretty though, and certainly not ladylike. Don't you?"

She hugs the raincoat close and dares to hope. "Really?" she asks suspiciously. "Where are we actually going?"

He pushes the door open and gestures out. "Nowhere," he says with a wink. "There's a perfectly fine garden here with adequate amounts of mud. Mind the horseradishes though, the gardener might not approve of you damaging them."

Okay, maybe this guy isn't so bad.

The look on her mom's face when she comes back to find her liberally mud-splattered daughter and her equally mud-splattered assistant makes her week, even though they both get scolded something fierce for the experience. Oddly, Peyton doesn't get fired. Emily is weirdly relieved by this, but she'll never admit it to either of them.

She doesn't get a chance to wear the ugly raincoat again, but she never throws it away.

 **.**

* * *

 **.**

William stares at him until Spencer can feel his face burning with the strain of it.

"Come on, Spencer," he coaxes, and pushes the stupid implements back at him. Spencer switches his gaze to them, wishing he could make them disappear just by the force of his misery. "I take you out for a nice dinner, and you're embarrassing me."

"Can't I just have a fork?" Spencer murmurs to the tablecloth, kicking his feet under the table. He's too short to reach the floor with his sneaker, and he feels like a child. An awkward, miserable child.

His father has that effect on him.

"Like this," William instructs, and picks up his own chopsticks, scooping up a small amount of wasabi on the end. "Just like this. Come on, it's not hard. You're supposed to be clever."

Biting his lip, Spencer tries again.

And fails again. The stain on the tablecloth mocks him and he drops the chopsticks with a clatter, folding his arms in his lap.

"I'm not hungry anymore," he says honestly, and his gut cramps. "I don't feel well."

There's a look on William's face he doesn't like. It's his 'I regret my life and my choices and especially my son' look, and Spencer's only too aware that they're exactly seven-hundred and eighty-three miles from home and escaping that look.

He's also very aware that this is very likely the last 'father-son' bonding road-trip he's ever going to have, and all because he's too _useless_ to work out how to use the same eating tool that over nine-hundred and ten million people have mastered.

"Spencer, stop making a scene or I'm taking you home," William snaps, and his face is red too now. "You're far too old to be acting like this."

Spencer hates the country. He hates road-trips. He hates _chopsticks_.

He just wants to go home.

"I'm only seven," Spencer whispers, more to himself than anyone, and starts to cry.

He wants his mom.

 **.**

* * *

 **.**

Sean feels things too easy. He always has. Aaron used to fast-forward through their battered Disney movies that Mom taped from rental-store copies, because if he didn't he'd have to deal with his brother bawling over the sad bits.

But when he's happy, he's ecstatic. Like right now, even though Aaron knows there's no reason to be. This is a reprieve. Just a reprieve.

It'll get bad again because it always does.

"This is so _cool_ ," his brother chants, kicking his heels into the dun-coloured belly under him. Aaron flinches as the animal huffs placidly and rolls its eyes, only too aware that he's out of reach if his brother gets bucked off the stupid thing. "Aw man, best holiday ever, right Aaron?"

"It's not a holiday, Sean," Aaron says quietly, and glances over at his mom. She's smiling, waving at them from the fence around the sandy ring they're being led around, and the bruise over her mouth hasn't faded.

They'll be home again before it does.

But he smiles and waves awkwardly with the hand not twined around the rein, because it's his job to look after his family and that means being happy when Mom is trying her best. And she is trying her best. She always does.

" _I'll take the boys and go,"_ she had threatened, and then she'd done exactly that. As soon as Aaron had heard the tired threat, he'd packed Sean's bag, thrown a couple of his own shirts in on top of his brother's things, and headed out the door.

Making it easy for her to leave.

She'd still go back though. She always will.

"I mean, I really don't like that lady." Sean is still yammering, pointing to the woman who owns the stables. She's wearing a frumpy jumper, there's hay in her hair, and Aaron thinks she's nice but naïve. She thinks that they're kids who just need a country holiday and a pony ride to forget that life is going to keep knocking them down, and she's right about Sean.

Aaron's fourteen though. He knows this is just a reprieve.

"I think she's nice," he says, and then, "Don't point."

Sean drops his hand. "She named her horses 'Hobbyhorse' and 'Horseradish', and 'Hobbyhorse' isn't even a horse. He's a pony. I mean, how much worse of a person can you be?"

Aaron tightens his knees around Horseradish's back and pretends to be having fun. He looks at his mom, the bruise on her mouth.

"Yeah, she's the worst," he lies, and keeps on pretending.

If he doesn't protect them, who will?

 **.**

* * *

 **.**

He should have known.

Desiree's been acting squirrelly, and squirrelly when it comes to his sister is always suspicious. Something is up with her, and he intends to find out what. It's a mystery, which is good.

He's always been great at solving mysteries.

And he solves this one easily.

"You been getting bullied and you didn't tell me?" he demands when he corners her at the school bus stop. "Why not?"

"Because you're not Dad," she snaps, turning her back on him. "Stop trying to solve all my problems, Derek. You're just making more of your own."

It's hypocritical of her, because he knows she's only acting tough so he doesn't get in another fight on her behalf, so she's hardly one to complain about unwanted protection.

"No, I'm not Dad, but I'm your brother and if you keep shuttin' me out I'm going to tell Mama about this," he whispers, hunching closer to her so Sarah doesn't hear. "She'll tear that school down and you know it."

"Don't you dare!" The bus pulls up, and she bolts.

But it's not over.

"Come on, Morgan. Why you gotta be like this?"

"Fuck off, Reynolds. Don't! Let go of my arm."

Derek pauses. They're by the school kitchens, and he'd know that shriek anywhere.

"Is that your sister?" James asks, pausing with his hand on his backpack strap. "Woah man, you get in another fight you're expelled for sure."

"That's my sister," Derek answers plainly, and turns away. What good is school anyway?

He reconsiders that surety when Kyle Reynolds is standing over him with his knuckles grazed and bloodied by Derek's face, and Derek can't breathe through the pain in his ribs. The guy is bigger than him, stupider than him, and luckier than him.

"What?" he spits, tasting copper. "You only interested in thirteen-year-old girls?"

Reynold's fist never falls because Desiree tastes that chance to smash a bottle of mustard oil over the guy's head.

"Don't touch my brother!" she shouts as he falls, and Derek's never been prouder. He tells her so as they sit in the principal's office and wait to be expelled.

"Maybe we can run away to the country before Mom finds out," Desiree says, right before their mom walks in the door and storms towards them.

Derek sighs. There's gotta be something said for family.

Even when they're pains in his arse.

 **.**

* * *

 **.**

"It's not fair."

JJ's trying not to sulk, she really is, but Rosaline gets to have _all_ the fun, and she gets to stay at the cabin with her parents and do stupid jigsaw puzzles. Holidays suck so bad. Especially ones where they go to silly country towns that don't have anything to do except tag after her sister…

"Well, honey, life isn't always fair," her mom says firmly, and turns around to pay attention to stupid Rosaline again and her stupid hair and her stupid _friends_ that she made somehow in the two days they've been here. JJ wants to go to the movies and have fun too…

"Aww, come on Jen," Ros says, poking her head into the room they're sharing. JJ ignores her. She can't even _look_ at her right now, she's so mad. "Don't be like this. What if I bring you home a present? Some popcorn maybe?"

Stupid. It won't be until late she gets home, way after the movie, and the popcorn will be cold and not the same anyway… JJ stares out the window so hard the forest at the edge of the park wavers and goes all wobbly in her vision.

She scrubs at her eyes to fix it, ignoring the heat and the damp.

She's not crying, not over stupid Rosaline. Not ever.

Ros touches her arm. She smells really nice, like Mom. Mom must have let her borrow her perfume.

 _Stupid_.

"Please don't be mad?" she pleads, and she always gets so upset when they fight. Always, no matter how small the fight actually is.

It makes it easier to be mean.

"If you go out without me," JJ says finally. "I'll hate you forever." She means it too. She'll _never_ forget this, not as long as she lives. They'll be old and wrinkly and JJ won't take Ros to the movies, see how she likes it!

"Okay," Ros says sadly, and leaves anyway.

What good are sisters?

JJ's asleep when Ros gets back, but when she wakes her there's a necklace on the bed next to her.

"Do you like it?" asks Ros from the other bed, poking her head up and smiling. "The lady said it was a rare butterfly and they put it in amber. I figured you'd know if it was or not."

JJ examines it. It's not rare. Not rare at all. It's just a Small White Butterfly and they're pests. Nana gets them on her horseradishes all the time. Besides, she's still angry at Ros, angry forever, and she can't like the gift if she's angry.

But she does anyway.

"It's super rare," she agrees, and slips out of bed to climb into her sister's. "There's only one hundred in the world like it. Help me?"

Ros helps her put it on and JJ decides that forever's far too long anyway. She'd rather have a butterfly in a necklace than a movie. It lasts longer.

 **.**

* * *

 **.**

Emma leans over him at the kitchen table and brings a waft of tomato and cinnamon that he gladly tilts his head back into.

"Cheating?" he asks her smugly, covering his homework with his hand, and she laughs and presses her mouth to his.

"Helping," she corrects him, and bounces away back to the bubbling pot on the stove. "You need it, Dave. So. Much. Help."

"Screw you," he says, and scratches his pen over his textbook distractedly. "This is dull. Why is this so dull. Surely there's gotta be more interesting stuff than this to teach us… like whatever that weirdass vegetable you're molesting over there is."

"This?" She holds up the weirdass vegetable thing, hefting it in her palm. "It's a horseradish. Obviously."

"Obviously," he repeats, and drops his nose to the textbook, closing his eyes.

The chair scrapes as she pulls it back and sits next to him. "Hey," she says softly, touching his hand, and his heart thrills in his chest. He's so damn lucky to know her. So damn lucky.

He doesn't know how to tell her that. Sixteen years old, cocky as a bull, and with no idea what way to charge.

"Are you okay?" She's still there. Still waiting for him.

"What am I doing with my life?" he asks her, peering at the sliver of her he can see out the corner of his eye with his nose to the book. "School, then college, then what? I've got no goals."

"School, then college, move to the country, have a few kids," she teases, and he snaps his head up to stare at her incredulously. "Or school, then college, then whatever bold and crazy idea you've got cooking in that head of yours."

"You don't think I'm the country type?" he asks.

She pokes the horseradish, rolling it across his textbook. "Nope," she says firmly. "Anything but. Now, stop moping or I'm going to make you eat this 'weirdass vegetable thing'. And there's not a damn thing you can do about it."

"I could love you?" he suggests, and proceeds to do just that before school and then college and then his 'bold and crazy idea' get in the way of it.

He ends up married to the work, and he only sometimes regrets it.

 **.**

* * *

 **.**

If she has to pick a least favourite out of all the shitty foster homes she's found herself being shoved into, this one is pretty high up there on the shitlist.

Well, the one where the food was rationed wasn't great. And there was the first one where she'd gotten split up from her little brother. The first night there had been… tearful. She wonders where Benji is now.

But at least they had no pigs.

And working computers.

Penelope curls her knees up tighter to her chest and peers through the cracks in the wooden floor down to where the two thick-backed draft horses are snuffling around in their stalls. They're probably the nicest thing about this place, this drafty, smelly, awful place in the middle of nowhere, with more _strangers_.

And she really, really doesn't like these strangers because they smile a lot and look worried when she doesn't smile back and if it were any other time, like pre-car crash time, Penelope would like them immediately. They're old but tough and a little soft at the edges, and she can tell they're the kind of people who take kids in just because they _care_.

That makes them dangerous because there was never any danger of her liking the food-rationers, or the ones who took her but not Benji because 'boys are awful trouble'.

She doesn't want to like them. She just wants to exist for another two months until she's eighteen and the state doesn't have to give a legal damn about the existence of Penelope Anne Garcia anymore. Then she can find her way to a city and do… something. Anything.

Disappear.

"Penelope?"

She shrinks further into herself as the ladder into the loft creaks and Mrs. Harley pokes her head up. "Penelope?" she says again, and there's that sad ever-present worry again. "Are you hungry, love?"

Ohhhhh. Penelope _likes_ them.

She bites her lip so she doesn't cry and refuses to answer.

A soft sigh and the creak of the ladder, and the lady who'd opened her home to her shuffles away. Penelope should be happy. She'd gotten what she wanted. She's alone and in no danger of being fussed over.

She feels awful.

"Damn," she sighs, and crawls through the hay to climb slowly down and wander out of the barn onto the muddy track to the house, the horses whuffing at her in greeting as she goes.

She's only partway back when she hears the distinctive sound of someone cussing in the fenced in garden. Despite her firm surety that she doesn't need to talk to these people more than she has to, just to avoid any… affections being made… she follows that cussing because it sounds tired and frustrated.

"Mr. Harley?" she calls, closing the gate behind her and edging through the neat rows of tomatoes to where the man is wrestling with a shovel. "Are you okay?"

He turns and peers at her through his glasses. "Ahh, Penny," he says, and smiles. Her heart twists.

Damn damn damn and blast.

"I was just… going," she mumbles, and backs away.

"Penny." His voice is sharp, and he leans on the shovel, watching her carefully. "Stay. How about I show you how to harvest the horseradish. They're ready, you know. Gotta get them before they over ripen, or they'll be woody and good for nothing."

She shakes her head. Then she says, "I don't… want to."

"Okay." He nods slowly. "That's a pity. I do enjoy having a young thing around to chat to while I work. But if you don't want to, I'm not going to push you. I'm not going to threaten you or coerce you or anything you might have had in the past from others. But I am going to ask, once a week, for as long as you're here, because you're always welcome."

He turns back and begins to dig at the ground again.

She stands and watches for the longest time, then she makes up her mind.

Maybe it will make the two months pass quicker.

"Do you have another shovel?" she asks, and he smiles.

"Thought you'd never ask."


End file.
